Back in March I wrote about how we couldn't find any alcohol swabs in stores because of a recall. Well, we've got some now. Anyone else want some?
Here's the story:
Our local pharmacy had some behind the counter, but as they were more expensive than the others we only got a box. Later that week Nadia bought six boxes for about $5 delivered through an online store. Pretty good deal that.
A couple of days go by, and one morning the doorbell rings while I'm making breakfast. I go over and check the window to see who it is, and there's a tall stack of boxes next to the door. I mean TALL, tall like up to my chest tall.
I felt like Milo from The Phantom Tollbooth (film rendition),
when he hears a thud in the room next to him and finds a giant gift wrapped box inside. In other words,
very surreal.
At first I thought they might not be the swabs, but there were six boxes, and each one had clear print that indicated they were indeed the alcohol swabs Nadia had ordered.
Okay, then they must be
over packaged, as Amazon is famous for. Nope. As I moved them inside the house, they were too sturdy and heavy to be just one little box of swabs surrounded by packing peanuts or whatever. Unless they used phone books for padding.
So I opened one up, and found four smaller boxes inside. Eh? I took out one of the smaller boxes, and inside were six boxes of alcohol swabs.
"The fuck."

In a fraction of a second the gravity of the situation dawned on me, and the in-laws walked in to find me paused in the exact moment of realisation.
"What's all that?"
"Err, alcohol swabs I think."
"
All of that is alcohol swabs? How many did Nadia buy?"
"Six I think... but there must be a mistake. I'll wake up Nadia."
I left the man-high stack of boxes there and ran downstairs to wake her. If you ask Nadia to tell you the story, it's starts with her waking up to find me staring at her all wild eyed.
"How many alcohol swabs did you order?!"
"Shfgu... whaa?"
"Alcohol swabs! You just orderd six, right?"
"hfg... yeah, six... why?"
Since I've got a reputation for being a lying prankster, I make the most serious face I can, and then with the most calm and serious voice I can I say:
"You need to come see this."
We get back upstairs and I count them. Six boxes containing four boxes, which each contain six boxes containing 100 swabs. That's a total of
14,400 alcohol swabs! If we use five a day, and we don't, we'd have enough for almost 8 years.
As Nadia and her parents talk back and forth I start to daydream how it came to be that we were sent this many swabs for $5 delivered. How, in a warehouse somewhere in Virginia, someone's scratching their heads trying to figure out why they're sold out of alcohol swabs already - we stocked up with BOXES of them!
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